


Take A Picture (It'll Last Longer)

by RushingHeadlong



Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:27:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26973646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RushingHeadlong/pseuds/RushingHeadlong
Summary: If Jim was still alive and still with Freddie he would absolutely have an instagram account where he mostly posts photos of their cats and the garden.
Relationships: Jim Hutton/Freddie Mercury
Comments: 2
Kudos: 39





	Take A Picture (It'll Last Longer)

**Author's Note:**

> Exactly what it says in the summary, this is just straight-up Modern/Everyone Lives AU fluff because sometimes that's just what you need in life.

Jim’s joints creak loudly as he crouches down slowly in front of the chair. Oliver cracks open one eye and gives him an unimpressed look as Jim raises his phone and waits for him to settle down again - but the cat has other plans, as cats so often do and instead of simply closing his eyes and falling back asleep in the same position, he sits up and starts licking his paw and washing his face.

“Did you really have to do that?” Jim asks, crossly. He snaps a few pictures anyway but Oliver is always moving _just_ enough that they come out looking blurry and horrible, and Jim’s knees are starting to strongly protest the position that he’s in so he soon gives up on waiting for the perfect photo moment.

He stands with a groan that actually startles Oliver into stillness for a moment, and the cat watches him somewhat warily as Jim sits down on the little patio table just in front of the chair. He deletes the unusable photos while keeping one eye on Oliver in case the cat decides to settle down again. Oliver is the most photographic of their five cats, but he’s also the one that gets the most skittish once the phone comes out so Jim doesn’t want to entirely give up on this opportunity quite yet.

Across the garden, he watches as Bella stalks along the edge of the flowerbed. The other cats are still inside, Mochi because she’s still too young for Freddie to want to let her out of his sight, and Gus because he’s getting to be too old to venture outside. Where Cleo is he has no idea but hopefully she’s just hiding inside somewhere; Freddie tends to fret about the cats a little bit more these days, and he can hardly sleep at night unless he knows that they’re all inside and safe.

Oliver pauses and peers around the edge of the chair and Jim, seizing his chance, snaps a photo of him, before he too turns to see what has caught the cat’s attention.

It’s Freddie, of course, standing in the doorway and watching Jim and Oliver with a smile on his face. Jim raises his phone and Freddie laughs as Jim snaps another photo, and then another as Freddie walks over, and a third one right before Freddie plucks the phone out of his hand and sits down in the chair next to Oliver. Oliver meows in quiet protest, but once Freddie starts scratching behind his ear he settles down quickly enough.

“Taking photos for instagram again, dear?” Freddie asks over the sound of Oliver’s quiet purrs.

“Trying to, at least,” Jim says. “I’m hoping I have at least one good photo in there.”

“Well, certainly not the ones of me,” Freddie says as he scrolls through the pictures on Jim’s phone. “Oh, but you do have a nice one of Oliver here!”

Jim reaches out for his phone and Freddie hands it over so Jim can see the photo that he took right before Freddie arrived. “That did turn out nice,” Jim agrees.

His thumb slips and he accidentally swipes over to the first photo he took of Freddie. It captured the beginning of Freddie’s laugh, with his eyes just starting to crinkle at the corners and his smile just starting to widen. He looks beautiful and Jim blurts out, “Hey now, this photo of you is nice too!”

“Ugh, no it isn’t,” Freddie says, wrinkling his nose. “I look fucking _old_ in that picture.”

“Freddie,” Jim says, trying to smother a laugh. “You _are_ old. And you’re still beautiful.”

“You’re just trying to soften me up so I’ll let you post that instead of the one of the cat,” Freddie mutters.

That may be a little bit true but Jim still reminds him, “You know that I’m not going to post anything you don’t want me to.”

It’s fairly rare for him to post photos of Freddie at all, and Jim doesn’t mind deleting pictures of the cats or the garden that Freddie, for whatever reason, doesn’t want posted online either. Freddie has always valued his privacy, after all, and his comfort is more important to Jim than sharing cat photos with the world.

“Yes, well, don’t post that photo of me then,” Freddie says.

And it’s easy for Jim to agree with that. “Alright, then. Is the one of Oliver still fine?”

“Of course it is.” Freddie scritches Oliver under his chin, and Oliver stretches his neck out and rubs his head along Freddie’s leg. “Everyone needs to appreciate our beautiful, boy, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, of course,” Jim agrees, as he uses Freddie’s momentary distraction to raise his phone again and snap one more photo of Freddie and his cat.


End file.
